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Iraq

Samira Abdullah Shehim, a mother of three, could not believe her ears when she was approached by her late husband’s friend with a proposal she never imagined to hear one day. "He was offering me a temporary marriage in exchange for a good gold piece and some monthly income," the 32-year-old widow from the southern city of Najaf told IslamOnline.net. "He told me that it was going to be a marriage for pleasure and he could end it any time he wanted," she explained.

A young Iraqi woman was run over by her father in a car in an alleged honour killing in the United States after her behaviour became "too Western", police said. Noor Faleh Almaleki, 20, whose family had moved to Phoenix, Arizona, was hit by her father's Jeep last month as she walked across a car park. She lay in a coma for two weeks in hospital before dying.

The report "‘They Want Us Exterminated': Murder, Torture, Sexual Orientation and Gender in Iraq", published by Human Rights Watch August 2009, documents a wide-reaching campaign of extrajudicial executions, kidnappings, and torture of gay men in Iraq.

A new wave of violence targeting Iraq's Christian community has raised questions about the safety of religious minorities amid concerns about Iraqi forces' ability to maintain security after the 30 June withdrawal of US combat forces.

As organized killings of Iraqi gays have escalated in recent months amid a homophobic campaign in that nation's media, openly gay Democratic Congressman Jared Polis of Colorado has asked the US State Department to investigate.